Other themes over the years have included York Minster’s East Window, the Yorkshire coastline and the Brontes. (Paul Robinson)Big Issue North interviews comic writer Samantha Irby.
You take a candid and darkly comic approach to writing about physical and mental health, bereavement and other serious issues. Is it important to be able to write in this way without worrying about causing offence?I try to be sensitive to other people’s experiences while also being true to my own, and I think if I’m being honest about my experiences I can’t imagine why that would be offensive to another person. Someone is always going to be offended so matter what you do, so as long as I’m not intentionally writing something to harm another person or jokes that punch down I really can’t worry about it or I’d never write anything ever.The Michigan Daily discusses the TV show You and its depiction of reading.
Aren’t people out there writing racist manifestos and Twilight fanfic? If you don’t like graphic sex jokes and toilet humour then my books aren’t for you, full stop. It’s not like it’s the news or whatever! No one is forcing my cat essays full of swearwords on small children in kindergarten! Sophomore year of high school I didn’t want to read Jane Eyre because it seemed like a snoozapalooza so I didn’t. I’m sure Charlotte Brontë was crushed. Oh wait, she’s dead but also who cares what I think? The world continued to turn, and I got a C+ in English that semester. If you don’t like what I do, don’t read it. It’s that easy. (Antonia Charlesworth)
“You”’s approach seems to me like, and hopefully is, a commentary upon this way of looking at reading and writing, holding Joe and Beck alike under criticism. Yet it is still off-putting, because the portrayal of the literary world in “You” is so instantly recognizable as the dreamy world of reading and writing that many people often incorrectly picture. The classicist view of literature is so often confined to the sorts of masterpieces Joe and Beck so often reference, like “Wuthering Heights.” When many people picture curling up with a book for fun, they picture the same leatherbound, beautiful, carefully maintained hardbacks that Joe keeps stored up in the glass prison below his bookstore. These — Joe preaches repeatedly to Beck and to the audience — are classics; they are works by the masters, some of the best pieces of art humanity has ever produced. There’s a reason the image of the Mooney’s bookstore resonates with us: We’ve seen it before, time and time again.The Catalan edition of El País (Spain) refers to Elizabeth Gaskell's Life of Charlotte Brontë.
But the show skims past some of the problems with this romantic view of literature. The “classics” don’t include everybody; in fact, they have traditionally been extremely exclusive. I would argue that some of the most exciting, dynamic and interesting things that have ever happened in the world of literature are happening right now. We’re so lucky to live in an era when so many literary boundaries are being pushed in terms of subject matter, genre and style. We’re lucky to live in a time when the exclusive past of the literary canon is finally being recognized with, and the voices of queer writers, writers of color, female writers, indigenous writers and more writers from traditionally marginalized communities are starting to be amplified. “You”’s treatment of the literary community — via, again, the purposefully distasteful characters of Joe and Beck — makes no mention of this, choosing instead to elevate the names of long-dead writers whose voices have been glorified plenty enough anyway. (Laura Dzubay)
Així se’ns ha acudit arran de la lectura del llibre d’Elizabeth Gaskell, Vida de Charlotte Brontë (traducció d’Ángela Pérez, Barcelona, Alba, 2016), que molts crítics anglesos consideren la millor biografia escrita en anglès després de la que Boswell va escriure sobre Samuel Johnson (Barcelona, Acantilado, 2007). Tant de l’una com de l’altra pot dir-se això que hem afirmat als paràgrafs precedents. Gaskell, ella mateixa una enorme novel·lista, va rebre l’encàrrec de redactar una biografia de la més gran de les germanes Brontë, i va escriure aquest llibre, en què és molt fàcil que el lector —llevat que sigui un gran coneixedor de l’època victoriana— no distingeixi amb tota claredat si es tracta d’una biografia o d’una novel·la. Això passa amb quasi totes les biografies del segle XIX, amb excepcions tan òbvies, per exemple, com les Converses amb Goethe, a càrrec del seu secretari Eckermann, que ja es presenten, objectivament, com una recopilació de converses (tot i això, el llibre és ple de ficcions). Si no és en casos com aquest, malgrat que una biografia com aquesta de Carlota Brontë contingui una llarga sèrie de cartes de la biografiada i moltes opinions seves sobre escriptors del seu temps (Thackeray, George Sand, Balzac, les seves germanes), el lector tan aviat pot decantar-se per la idea que està llegint història —la petita història d’una sola persona, la seva obra i el seu context— com una “història” en el sentit narratiu.AnneBrontë.org has written a post 'In Loving Remembrance Of Tabby Aykroyd'.
Almenys en el gènere de la novel·la de tall realista, tan versemblant i tan honorable pot ser la vida dels éssers anònims com la vida d’una d’aquelles persones que, per mèrits o demèrits a la seva vida, ha entrat en l’altre registre, el del gènere biogràfic. (Jordi Llovet) (Translation)
A new production of Blake Morrison's We Are Three Sisters opens tomorrow in Skipton:Skipton Players presentsKeighley News and Craven Herald have further information.
We Are Three Sisters
by Blake Morrison
Skipton Little Theatre
19th to 23rd February 2019
Poet, playwright and novelist Blake Morrison evokes the lives of the Brontë sisters, with a nod to Chekhov’s Three Sisters.
Against the backdrop of a windswept northern village, three remarkable young women live their lives brightly.
In Haworth in the 1840s, in a gloomy parsonage, where there are neither curtains nor comforts, Charlotte, Anne and Emily Brontë light up their world with outspoken wit, aspirations, dreams and ideas. And throughout their confined lives intensely lived… they write.
With a touch of poetic licence, Morrison shows us the overwhelming humanity, charged emotions and brooding unease which characterise the Brontë household – and that of Chekhov’s Three Sisters.
The Brontë set is the obvious headliner, setting Emily’s poems to music and recording them at the Brontës’ parsonage home using their regency piano. It’s haunting – Emily seems half in love with easeful death – but less resonant than its companions. The Sea Is a Woman, with lyrics by Peake, has Rachel Unthank at her most poignant. The first world war set features singer Sam Lee and a string accompaniment for a Siegfried Sassoon poem. The piano arrangements of Adrian McNally sometimes fly, sometimes plod, but the ethereal sibling harmonies rarely falter. (Neil Spencer)Meera Sabaratnam argues in The Sunday Times for the importance of decolonising British education and gives the example of Jane Eyre and Wide Sargasso Sea. A piece of advice: your arguments seem more solid if you choose the right sister:
I was quite young when I first read Jane Eyre. I chose it because I had read Roald Dahl’s Matilda, and she had read Emily Brontë’s Jane Eyre (sic). Being a girl who wanted to be clever, I decided to read it too. Jane Eyre was also a young clever woman — plucky, spirited, hard-working, independent, discreet, self-sacrificing and so on; she was eventually rewarded for her moral forbearance with a sudden inheritance from an uncle in Madeira and marriage to the man she had forsworn for his attempted bigamy.Intriguing news in Broadway World:
It was more or less two decades later that I read Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys. This multi-vocal novel focuses on the fate of Bertha Mason/Antoinette Cosway, the first Mrs Rochester — a Creole woman with her own tumultuous upbringing and struggles, who Rochester married hastily in the West Indies in search of a fortune. Antoinette, renamed Bertha by her husband, suffers unstable mental health, removal to England and the breakdown of her marriage before becoming the woman locked in the tower at Thornfield Hall. She eventually burns it down.
With Wide Sargasso Sea, Rhys, a Dominican author with a Creole mother and a Welsh father who had moved to England, puts Jane Eyre into a critical dialogue with the colonial historical conditions of its own production. Most crucially it calls on the reader to confront the significance of the “others” whose own life journeys, quests for justice and sacrifices are intertwined with, but meaningfully distinct from, Jane’s own. I experienced reading this as a form of “growing up”. It was of course destabilising to have the neat morality of the first novel torn open, but ultimately it disclosed a fuller, richer, more difficult and more interesting view of the world and of humanity.
In studying literature, can we read and think about Jane Eyre now without also reading and thinking about Wide Sargasso Sea? We could, although this would be both an unnecessary restriction and disservice to our students. So would a literature curriculum that failed to introduce students to the broader diversity and richness of writing in English from around the world, as well as within Britain. This is even before we get to questions of how to unpick our habitual monolingualism and the narrowness it produces.
Director at the Ophelia Theatre Group. Billie Aken-Tyers is currently developing an adaptation of Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë, slated for pre production in 2019. for more information visit www.billieakentyers.com.Megan Kenyon in The Student didn't like Lily Cole's approach to Emily Brontë in The Secret Life of Emily Brontë. Too personal in her opinion.
Recently, a documentary aired on the BBC, detailing The Secret Life of Emily Brontë. Instead of being an elegy to the tragic life of one of Britain’s most extraordinary authors, the programme delivered an ego-boost for its already widely successful host, Lily Cole. Cole, a philanthropist, model, and actress, repeatedly took possession of Emily Brontë, comparing their lives, discussing her personal experiences of Brontë’s writing and introducing a documentary which Cole herself had created based upon Wuthering Heights. As a viewer, I felt detached from my own experiences of Emily Brontë’s writing. It appeared that everything I had felt whilst reading Brontë’s exhilarating novel and haunting poetry, was invalid.The bedrooms of American TV shows in The Huffington Post:
But let us not forget that Emily Brontë wrote Wuthering Heights neither for Cole, nor me. Brontë wrote her novel for an unquantifiable audience, for anyone and everyone who could relate to the words on the page. Lily Cole already has a platform, she already has a voice yet hers was seemingly the only one that mattered.
From the posters in Seth Cohen’s bedroom, I learned that he was into comic books and video games. From Rory Gilmore’s (Gilmore Girls) bedroom I found out that she wanted to go to Harvard and liked reading Charlotte Brontë and Shakespeare. (Chandni Doulatramani)Kirkus reviews The Confessions of Fannie Langton by Sara Collins:
Most of all, she has created in her title character a complex, melancholy, and trenchantly observant protagonist; too conflicted in motivation, perhaps, to be considered a heroine but as dynamic and compelling as any character conceived by a Brontë sister.Eidos on Patheos posts about Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston:
The novel’s main character is like Brontë’s Jane Eyre. Janie becomes a free and independent woman through suffering. Unlike Bronte, Hurston does not choose a conventional happy ending, yet Janie is no less content than Jane. (John Mark N. Reynods)Stuff (New Zealand) describes a trip to Puglia, Italy:
Studded with cacti and luxuriantly-leafed trees, radiant, butterfly-attracting flowers and Baroque buildings made with the distinctive yellow "Lecce" stone that is so common in this part of Puglia, the courtyard has such a timeless charm you half-expect to see characters from a costume drama, say the Italian equivalent of a story by Jane Austen, Charlotte Bronte or Thomas Hardy, milling about. (Steve McKenna)The Wardrobe (Italy) interviews book blogger Elena Giorgi:
Simona Melani: Quale tra i romanzi classici della letteratura tratta meglio l’amore secondo te?Culturepoing (France) reviews the DVD edition of Mario Bava's La Frusta e il Corpo:
Mi viene subito in mente Jane Eyre di Charlotte Brontë, che racconta l’amore in ogni sua sfumatura.
Jane è davvero un’eroina straordinaria, un’antesignana dell’indipendenza femminile, soprattutto se pensiamo che il romanzo fu pubblicato nel 1847.
Fin da bambina Jane conosce maltrattamenti e freddezza, che poi inizia a colmare con l’amore per l’amica Helen, incontrata in collegio; grazie alla passione per i libri e lo studio riesce a emanciparsi e a diventare un’istitutrice; conosce l’amore adulto quando si ritrova a lavorare per Mr. Rochester e rinnova l’amore per la propria dignità e indipendenza quando scopre che egli nasconde un terribile segreto.
Insomma, Jane Eyre racchiude in sé buona parte delle forme d’amore possibili, che Charlotte Brontë racconta senza cadere nei cliché dell’epoca. (Translation)
Dès le générique sur fond rouge avec ses accords de piano déchirants, Le corps et le fouet s’inscrit dans un ailleurs, invoque les fantômes littéraires des Hauts de Hurlevent et des nouvelles d’Edgar Allan Poe. (Emmanuel Le Gagne) (Translation)
The Revelation to Jane: Christianity and Apocalypse in Jane EyreEDIT: The Herald Mail talks about this essay:
Claudia McCarron
SIGMA TAU DELTA RECTANGLE
Journal of Creative Writing
Volume 94, 2019, pp. 153-160
In The Madwoman in the Attic, Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar write that while Jane Eyre employs “the mythic quest-plot” of John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, it lacks that work’s “devout substance”. Not devout, perhaps, but deeply religious: while Charlotte Brontë appropriates biblical typology in a manner that was perplexing (and occasionally infuriating) to her conservative Anglican peers, her novel is still deeply informed by biblical tradition. The novel contains nearly two hundred direct biblical allusions and even more of its plot threads and imagery can be traced to biblical archetypes (Tkacz 3). Jane Eyre is a text as preoccupied with religious truth as it is freedom, feminism, and love, and Brontë’s biblical discourse intersects with these themes in eye-opening and potentially revolutionary ways.
McCarron’s paper examines the parallels between “Jane Eyre” and the Book of Revelation. The paper argues that “Jane Eyre” can be read as a female-centered reworking of the biblical book. McCarron said she wrote the paper for a Bible as Literature class in the fall of 2018.
“It actually began as a failure,” she said. “I was struggling to find a critical argument that I was excited to write about.”
Agnes Grey’s Search for Self-Identity in Agnes Grey by Anne Brontë
Yanti Rahayuningsih
Acuity, Journal of English Language, Pedagogy, Literature and Culture, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 59-65, 1 (2019)
This study aims to reveal, identify and describe Agnes Grey's search for self-identity. Also, the writer of the thesis wants to show that the situations in Agnes Grey's adolescence period are the same as the real life of the author, Anne Brontë. The research method used is the psychology of literature. The results of the analysis indicated that by using theory from Erik H. Erikson, Agnes Grey found her true self in three stages.
Pet Lamb and Clothed Hyena: Law as an Oppressive Force in Jane Eyre
Alexander Maine
The Student Journal of Professional Practice and Academic Research, Vol 1, No 1 (2019)
Writing in 1864, the literary critic Justin M’Carthy stated that ‘the greatest social difficulty in England today is the relationship between men and women.’ This came at a time of unprecedented social and legal change of the status of women in the 19th Century. A prominent novel of the time concerning such social difficulty is Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre: An Autobiography which attempts to reflect these social difficulties as often resulting from law. As such, the novel may be used as a reflection of the condition of nineteenth century English law as an oppressive force against women. This force is one that enacts morality through legality, and has particular resonance in literature concerning social issues. Jane Eyre will be discussed as a novel that provides insights into women’s experiences in the mid-nineteenth century. Law is represented within the novel as an oppressive force that directly subjugates women, and as such the novel may be regarded as an early liberal feminist work that challenges the condition of law. This article will explore the link between good moral behaviour, and moral madness, the latter being perceived as a threat to the domestic and the law’s response to this threat. It will pick upon certain themes presented by Brontë, such as injustice towards women, wrongful confinement, insanity and adulterous immoral behaviour, to come to the conclusion that the novelist presented law as a method of constructing immorality and injustice, representing inequality and repression.
Emily Brontë, first world war poets and campaigner Lillian Bilocca are the focus of the UK folk band’s song cycle trilogy.The Irish Examiner and the history of curtains:
Emily Brontë has exerted an understandably wide influence on popular music. Kate Bush’s debut single, of course, but Wuthering Heights also fed into Genesis’s Wind & Wuthering and gave titles to its instrumental diptych “‘Unquiet Slumbers For The Sleepers . . . ” and “ . . . In That Quiet Earth’”; Cliff Richard cast himself as a 50-something Heathcliff in a musical version of the novel.
The Unthanks’ engagement with Brontë is restrained by comparison. Commissioned for the Brontë Society to mark Emily’s 200th birthday, Adrian McNally set some of her poems for the sisters Rachel and Becky Unthank to sing, to his accompaniment on Brontë’s own five-octave cabinet piano. The recording was made after hours in the writer’s old home (now museum), Haworth Parsonage, and the songs are punctuated by creaking floorboards and echoing footsteps. The songs, from “High Waving Heather” onwards, meld the sublime, the romantic and the gothic.
Emily Brontë is one of the three EPs that make up this collection, together roughly the length of a single CD, about lines of poetry, defensive lines, fishing lines. (David Honigmann)
I always think of Jane Eyre in the opening passage of Charlotte Brontë’s book of 1847 shivering in fear in that bit of pathetic hiding behind the hefty Victorian curtains. (Kya deLongchamps)NBC's The Today Show recommended Jane Eyre as one of the best love stories in literature:
Savannah Guthrie's Pick: "Jane Eyre," by Charlotte BrontëThe Irish Times interviews the actress Caitriona Balfe:
Part mystery, part love story, "Jane Eyre" was Savannah's pick for the greatest love story of all time.
Books played a large role in Balfe’s upbringing. When she was about six or seven, her father, a garda, decided that the family wasn’t going to have a television. For about six years, the only time she and her siblings had television at home was for two weeks at Christmas. So she read. Everything. Before she began secondary school, her favourite book was Wuthering Heights. (Una Mullally)Kerrang! interviews Peter Murphy, from the band Bauhaus, about being a goth:
Gothic novels like Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein dealt with a lot of staring into the sea, reflecting on unrequited love, and the sheer, extraordinary pain of being mortal. To truly be “goth” is to understand the sheer darkness and power of one’s own feelings.BookRiot recommends reading Jane Eyre if you are single:
All you care about right now is your own well-being. You know there’s someone right for you just around the corner, or you simply just not that worried about that. Therefore, you need a leading female character to remind you that you’re also strong and determined, and nothing’s impossible when you put your mind to it. Jane Eyre is a fair choice. She’s a woman ahead of her time that maintains her principles of justice, human dignity, and morality above all, always succeeding at asserting herself to whom threatens her autonomy. Enjoy! (Laura Melgão)NPR's Ask Me Another has a glimpse into a terrible, but frankly not unimaginable, future:
Ophira Eisenberg: Michael Ian Black also has a podcast called Obscure, where he reads Thomas Hardy's book "Jude The Obscure" out loud and comments on it, which - this is actually the template for the future of American education. This is how people are going to learn about classic literature. They're going to listen to podcasts of classic works read by celebrities. That's how it's going to work. Homework is going to be, like, listen to "Jane Eyre" as read by Post Malone. You know...Fionola Meredith in The Belfast Times has had enough of Valentine's foolishness:
(LAUGHTER)
Eisenberg: ...That's going to be the thing. After that, listen to RuPaul's "A Brief History Of Time."
Perhaps the impossible weight of expectations gets to them: the realisation that their relationship is less Heathcliff and Cathy (and that didn't end well), more Itchy and Scratchy. Or maybe it's the unbearable thought of the love sausage and its gruesome ilk.Polygon reviews the TV series The Umbrella Academy:
But Valentine's Day is a mere flash in the pan compared to the monstrous commercialism of the wedding industry, which brazenly takes the idea of romantic love and turns it into cold, hard, loveless cash.
At times, The Umbrella Academy feels like it has more in common with the Gothic works of the Brontë sisters than it does with superhero tutelage. (Petrana Radulovic)The New York Times publishes an obituary of the publisher and writer Betty Ballantine:
They were not alone in seeing the potential of the paperback market in the United States. Pocket Books had just started publishing quality paperbacks, breaking in with Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights” and James Hilton’s “Lost Horizon.” (Katharine Q. Seelye)The Press Republican explores Valentine's Day from a Jewish point of view:
Novelist Emily Brontë said it this way in “Wuthering Heights”: “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”Live Mint goes a bit too far in saying that,
I love my wife, Betty, deeply, but I do not love her that way. (The God Squad - Rabbi Gellman)
The Brontë sisters, Anne and Emily, battled the consumption that killed them as they wrought their masterpieces. (Shreya Sen-Handley)Zibby Owens on Parents reminisces of how
Ever since I cried my way through the end of "Charlotte's Web" at age eight, hiding out in the dark after bedtime in the tiny Jack & Jill bathroom I shared with my little brother, I've been obsessed with books. I was the girl at sleep-away camp reading "Jane Eyre" on the scratchy, wool blanket while my bunkmates strung my counselors' bras from the rafters.La Libre (Belgium) asks their readers about their favourite books:
Liz, 19 ans "Les Hauts de Hurlevent" d’Emily BrontëNicaragua Diseña (Nicaragua) and Valentine books:
Brillant, glaçant, roman de la vengeance et de la passion destructrice, il s’agit ni plus ni moins d’un chef-d’œuvre. Emily Brontë a enfanté un monstre de la littérature, intemporel et terrible. La lecture m’a surtout apporté - et continue de le faire - de solides bases culturelles, mais aussi un apprentissage de la vie. J’ai grandi en lisant. Et puis naturellement, il s’agit pour moi d’une source d’évasion, une fenêtre ouverte sur d’autres cieux. (Louise Vanderkelen) (Translation)
Comenzamos con uno de mis libros favoritos de toda la vida; “Jane Eyre” todo un clásico de la literatura gótica. El libro te cuenta la historia de Jane, una huérfana con una vida difícil y llena de dolor debido al maltrato por parte de su tía y de la escuela. Al hacerse mayor, Jane decide dejar el internado y buscar trabajo por si sola, esto la lleva a la casa del señor Rochester como institutriz. Conforme pase el tiempo va a ir surgiendo una conexión especial entre Jane y Rochester, pero su relación no será nada fácil ya que él y la casa ocultan terribles secretos. (Abril Celeste) (Translation)Ystads Allehanda (Sweden) reviews Call Me By Your Name, the novel:
Men också att vilja förlora sig helt i den andre. ”Han är mer jag än vad jag själv är”, tänker Elio och använder Emily Brontës ord. Men Aciman behöver inte låna andras ord för att äkta och inkännande beskriva kärlek och begär. (Bella Sternberg) (Translation)ABC (Spain) talks about a new exhibition of Balthus in Madrid:
Frente a las vanguardias (pese a ir siempre a contracorriente, le influyen artistas como Bonnard, Derain o De Chirico), muestra mucho interés por el arte popular y el oriental. También por artistas como Caravaggio, Poussin y Courbet. López-Manzanares advierte en Balthus cierta melancolía:«No casa bien con el mundo moderno y mira al pasado. Comienza siendo un pintor rebelde (una especie de alter ego de Heathcliff en "Cumbres borrascosas"), intenta provocar y escandalizar con sus trabajos, tiene fe en cambiar el mundo, pero a partir de 1953 se aleja de él». (Natividad Pulido) (Translation)El Periódico de Aragón (Spain) reviews Siri Hustvedt's A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women - Essays:
¿Hay libros peligrosos? Desde luego, afirma Siri, recordando que el Huckleberry Finn de Mark Twain estuvo prohibido a los escolares norteamericanos. A ella le trastornó Cumbres Borrascosas, porque desató una ola de sentimientos desconocidos... (Juan Bolea) (Translation)Salamanca 24 horas (Spain) recommends the performances in Salamanca of the Teatre Lliure's production of Jane Eyre. A passing Wuthering Heights reference in Granma (Cuba) and a Brontë one in The Island (Sri Lanka). More Valentine mentions around: La Nación (Argentina), Libreriamo (Italy), Bluewin (Switzerland). The CAMRA Pub of the Seasons award has been given to the Wuthering Heights pub in Stanbury, Keighley News reports. The wildlife filmmaker Gordon Buchanan has visited the Parsonage.
The death of Charlotte Brontë from hyperemesis gravidarum and refeeding syndrome: A new perspective
Simon P. Allison, Dileep N. Lobo
Clinical Nutrition
Available online 10 February 2019
Many theories have been advanced concerning the cause of Charlotte Brontë's death, none of which fully explain all the symptoms she experienced in the course of her final illness. Her death certificate records the cause of death as phthisis (tuberculosis), but there is no evidence, other than circumstantial, to support this diagnosis. A diagnosis of Addison's disease, caused by tuberculosis of the adrenals, has been proposed, but this is unlikely, since it does not fit well with two and a half months of severe anorexia, nausea and vomiting, followed by remission of these symptoms and eventual death. We agree, as suggested by some authors, that the most likely diagnosis was hyperemesis gravidarum, but suggest that this was complicated by the refeeding syndrome consequent on recovery of her appetite after resolution of hyperemesis gravidarum and that this was the cause of her death. These two diagnoses are compatible with the remission in her symptoms of anorexia, nausea and vomiting in the third week of March 1855, followed by further decline and death.
Votary, vixen and vulgarian: German governesses and English domesticity in novels by Charlotte Yonge, Charlotte Brontë and Mary Braddon
Susan N. Bayley
Journal
Cultural and Social History
Published online: 04 Feb 2019
Among the most amusing vignettes in Victorian novels are German governesses created by Charlotte Yonge, Charlotte Brontë and Mary Braddon. Fräulein Ohnglaube is a votary who believes in ghosts. Fräulein Müller is a vixen with a secret ambition, and Fräulein Braun is a vulgarian who scoffs two breakfasts of beef and beer. All are depicted as potential threats to the values and norms of the English ‘cult’ of domesticity.This paper argues that these authors wished to preserve and celebrate "pure" English domesticity . Their negative representations of German governesses reveal how thoroughly English and anti-cosmopolitan were their conceptualisations of domestic life.
We have now officially opened for 2019 and have unveiled our new exhibition, ‘Patrick Brontë: In Sickness and in Health’ which explores how illness, poor health and death plagued his life.CTX Live Theatre reviews Jane Eyre the Musical at Emily Ann Theatre.
Objects on display include Patrick’s heavily-annotated medical manuals, Charlotte’s pillbox, with pills inside, Anne’s handkerchief, spotted with blood from her infected lungs, and lots of spectacles!
We also have a loan from Thackray Medical Museum – the type of ophthalmic instruments which would have been used to perform Patrick’s cataract surgery. So not for the squeamish amongst you!
At the end of the week, on Friday February 22, we have our first Parsonage Unwrapped evening of the year, which focuses on Patrick’s politics – in particular his relatively progressive opinions. Tickets cost £22.50/£20 and a complimentary drink is served on arrival.
The theme of Patrick’s politics is continued in our free Tuesday talk on March 5, which will examine Patrick’s campaigning, but specifically his campaigning for issues close to home, such as fundraising for the establishment of a Sunday school and a clean water supply. There’s no need to book for the Tuesday talk, but please go to bronte.org.uk/whats-on or call 01535 640192 for tickets for Parsonage Unwrapped.
I’m very excited that the museum is taking part in the first ever International Social Prescribing Day on March 14. Put simply, social prescribing is a way in which GPs and other health care professionals can help patients to improve their health and wellbeing by connecting them with local community services and activities.
And museums can play a part in this, offering opportunities to connect to others, connect with the environment (especially ours on the moors!), share stories and experiences, learn, and be inspired!
On the first ever Social Prescribing Day we’re offering free entry to residents who live in the BD22, BD21 and BD20 postcode areas and Thornton. Please come along and say hello, and take a look at our new Patrick Brontë exhibition – I’m sure Patrick would have been an advocate of social prescribing!
In the spirit of social prescribing, we’re celebrating Patrick’s birthday (fittingly St Patrick’s Day!) on March 17 in Haworth Old School Room between noon and 4pm. Everyone is welcome to come along to eat cake and hear about the community project we’re launching to discover more about Haworth in the time of the Brontës.
We’ll also be joined by guests, including Zaffar Kunial, our writer-in-residence, who will read from his new collection Us, and there will be craft activities for all the family. So please do join us to celebrate Patrick and hear more about our plans for the rest of the year. No need to book – just come along. I hope to see you there!
The essential sentimental movement of the novel and the play occurs through the relationship between Rochester and his employee Jane. Given the circumstances and English class structure, the gradual changes are repressed, ambiguous, and close to imperceptible. Rochester is caustic and often dismissive; he's absent for long periods and one gets the notion that he's something of a self-hating wastrel. Derek Smootz successfully navigates those shoals and constraints, signaling the evolution of Rochester's feelings with impressive subtlety. Opposite him, Devyn Collie is admirable as Jane, a study in severely correct black whose vivid eyes and contained expressions betray depths of sensitivity. The growing attachment of the characters is signaled much more by the music than by overt physical gesture.The Washington Post has selected 'The 23 most unforgettable last sentences in fiction' and one of them is related to a Brontë work, but not from a Brontë work.
The style of the work is closer to opera than to the typical Broadway musical. Each of the two acts features more than twenty musical numbers, written in complex musical lines designed to reveal character and emotion. There is little repetition of the melody. Coached by musical directors Maddie Tatman and Tommie Jackson, both in the cast, the company performs to a recorded orchestral soundtrack. Sound board operator Cameron Rivers manages levels to assure the singers are always heard.
The cast is large, with 28 actors listed in the program. Director Farias Gates stages intimate scenes with a good awareness of the requirements of theatre in the round, and when she brings the full cast into that sacred space, it's with good effect. The many costumes designed or assembled by the director create an air of authenticity. Jane Eyre is not a dancing musical, despite a party scene with some waltzes choreographed by Melissa May Moncus; crowd scenes are for social gatherings or for musical presentations that remind us that Jane and Rochester as individuals are hemmed in by social constraints.
There are some juicy minor parts, characters whose clever quirks are Dickensian. Among them are socialite Blanche Ingram, played by the pert, attractive Jillian Linton, a notably gifted soprano; slightly dizzy housekeeper Mrs. Fairfax, played by Karin Cunningham; Tommie Jackson as Rochester's brother-in-law; and Chris Schaible as the missionary clergyman who courts Jane after her disappointments.
Jane Eyre is presented every weekend through March 3 in a space that seats an audience of about 65. This production targets and generally achieves a level of sophistication and excellence in musical performance that's rare in community-based theatre. And there's not a bad seat in the house. (Michael Meigs)
“Reader, I did not even have coffee with him. That much I learned in college.”We humbly think that the last sentence from Wuthering Heights is quite unforgettable and would have made a nice 24.
“A Gate at the Stairs,”
by Lorrie Moore (2009)
Novels and short stories make different demands on their forms — and their readers. That contrast is most evident in the final moments. Lorrie Moore, one of the best short story writers alive, once said, “The end of a story is really everything,” and for many years it seemed she had abandoned novel writing altogether. Then — after a 15 year hiatus — came “A Gate at the Stairs,” about a witty young woman trying to figure out adult life in the face of two unspeakable tragedies. You can see in this novel’s last words how successfully Moore switches registers. Knowing that the complex power of her book is already complete, the very ending offers a sigh of emotional relief: a wry repudiation of “Jane Eyre.” (Ron Charles)
3. My daughter recommends "My Plain Jane," a YA novel with Jane Eyre and Charlotte Brontë as the main characters. The book promises "there will be murder. Mayhem. Conspiracy. And, of course, romance." She read it in one day and would like you to read it, too. (Stephanie Curtis)BookRiot has compiled a list of graphic novels that are 'pretty enough to frame', including
2. Jane by Aline Brosh MacKenna and Ramon K. PerezStarTribune features writer Marlon James, who recently 'chatted with Minnesota Public Radio host Kerri Miller in front of a live audience at St. Paul's Fitzgerald Theatre'.
Jane is a modern-day retelling of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë. In this version, orphaned Jane works as a fisherwoman in New England before moving to New York City to attend art school. While in New York, Jane becomes a nanny for Adele and her mysterious father, Rochester, who houses many secrets in his upstairs rooms. Perez illustrates Jane’s years along the New England coast in muted, watery grays and blues. As Jane moves to New York, the illustrations change to black lines and brighter colors, showing a city where Jane feels truly alive. (Katherine Willoughby)
James told Miller other things: That he became a devout Christian in his late 20s because he thought it would help him not be gay. That he used to get depressed after he'd finished writing a novel, a depression that only lifted when he got back to writing another one. And that he remains a voracious reader with catholic tastes, taking in everything from "Jane Eyre" to the pulp novels of Jackie Collins and comics such as "Hellboy." (Rohan Preston)A contributor to The Johns Hopkins News-Letter tells about the first fantasy novel she wrote:
In high school I nursed wild ambitions of publishing a fantasy novel. The plot was muddy, but I knew my heroine. Her name was Elizia. She was a woman of color, and she spoke with all the outrageous, cringeworthy angst of a Brontë character. She was brave and intelligent and a born leader, a liberator of women and the poor who also dabbled with sorcery. (Sarah Y. Kim)A Den of Geek! writer is in Yorkshire.
I’m typing this sitting in Ted Hughes’ old farmhouse at Lumb Bank in Yorkshire. There is a beautiful view of the spooky mill valley down to Hebden Bridge. I’m sharing words and secrets with a wonderful bunch of fellow writers. I am in the nurturing arms of the Arvon Foundation spending a week immersed in writing.Value Walk looks at the most remade films.
The mist is terrifying. Any minute now Catherine Earnshaw could tap on the window wailing for Heathcliff. It’s perfect. [...]
I look at the view that inspired poets. The county that forged the Brontës. The wildness, the untamed beauty and harshness of the environment. Listen to the weather, which gets a bit primal when Storm Eddie hits. Take pleasure in our many voices, combined for one final night of readings in which we celebrate our achievements. (Jane Roberts)
Classic literature Jane Eyre, Great Expectations, and Oliver Twist have all seen success on the big screen, but directors seem to think they can make the movies better – and have remade them five times since the originals were released. (Jacob Wolinsky)And now for the leftovers of Valentine's Day. News OK shares a Valentine's Day movie list which includes
"Jane Eyre" (2011): Director Cary Fukunaga ("Sin Nombre") and his talented young cast, including Mia Wasikowska, Michael Fassbender and Jamie Bell, bring fresh energy to the often-adapted gothic tale. Every aspect of the narrative is heightened: The mystery crackles with suspense, the romance smolders with sensuality, and the coming-of-age story flares with intensity. (Brandy McDonnell)According to a 'hopeless romantic' writing for Elle,
It’s this magical complexity that makes romance compelling.Mashable argues that,
Great love stories are fraught with complication. Think of Gone With The Wind or Wuthering Heights. Fulfilling the impossible makes great romance. (Katie Glass)
The hegemony of the couple form is something we, as a society, are struggling to shed. And it's standing in the way of our perceptions of what it means to opt out of traditional dating structures, like not participating in dating. When we look back on the pop culture poster girls for singledom — Jane Eyre, Elizabeth Bennett, Carrie Bradshaw, Bridget Jones, Kat Stratford — all their stories end happily with them finding Mr. Right. The story ends with these shrewish bluestockings finding a cure for their ailment — and that cure is a man. Not only do I not want to take this medicine, I know for a fact I'm not ill. (Rachel Thompson)Qué Leer (Spain) recommends both Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë, Espasa Austral, traducción de Juan González-Blanco de Luaces, 456 pp., 21,90 €Jujuy al momento (Argentina) suggested women born under the sign of Aquarius read Wuthering Heights for Valentine's Day.
La obra que consagró a su autora en el cánon universal, tiene los ingredientes de una novela gótica, pero rebasa con mucho las convenciones del género. Jane, la protagonista, nos muestra un nuevo modo de descubrir la realidad, y con su reflexión la acompañamos en un viaje hacia la autenticidad.
Cumbres Borrascosas, Emily Brontë, Austral singular, traducción de Juan González-Blanco de Luaces, 416 pp.
Esta obra es una larga y extraordinaria descripción de los actos y problemas psicológicos de unos seres locos o perversos que arrastran una existencia mísera y maléfica. Con ellos, su autora nos ofrece una visión de estos personajes que actúan demoniacamente por aridez protestante que se diluye en todas y en cada una de sus páginas. (Translation)
Libro: Wuthering Heigths [sic] (Cumbres borrascosas), de Emily Brontë. Heathcliff y Catherine viven una apasionada historia de amor en una época llena de romanticismo. Ideal para las mujeres Acuario que gustan de estas historias tan intensas y capaces de romper convencionalismos. (Translation)The Sun listed popular love quotes from films and books, including one from Wuthering Heights. Actualidad Literatura (Spain) includes both Cathy and Heathcliff and Jane and Rochester on its top 5 literary couples.
We are a bit late for Valentine's Day, but better late than never:Open Book ChocolatesThey also sell Jane Eyre handmade Candles.
Jane Eyre
Bilberries in Milk Chocolate
3-Ounce Bar
Our Jane Eyre chocolate bar is inspired by Jane's flight from Thornfield Hall. After Mr. Rochester's attempt to marry Jane fails, she leaves with what little money she has saved, unsure of where she is going. When her money runs out, she finds bilberries (akin to blueberries) in the heath and makes a meal of them. Our chocolate bar contains the bilberries that represent Jane's resilience and her strength.
Ingredients: Organic Milk Chocolate (organic evaporated cane syrup, organic cacao beans, organic cocoa butter, organic full cream milk, organic soya lecithin), Organic Wild Bilberries.
Bradford's newly-relaunched blue plaque scheme will begin by honouring four previously unrecognised women who have done pioneering work in the worlds of social reform, literacy, childcare and aviation.More on remarkable people from Yorkshire in The Yorkshire Post:
The scheme will also honour a pioneering forensic scientist from Bradford as well as the city’s newly refurbished St George’s Hall and the former Odeon building as part of its ‘historic buildings’ category.
The first five new ‘people plaques’ for Bradford will seek to address an historic gender imbalance of memorials in the city by being dedicated to female Bradfordians who have made a significant contribution to the wellbeing and cultural status of the city.
These include: Trade unionist and suffragette Julia Varley OBE; Renowned writer Malachi Whitaker; Philanthropist Florence Moser; George Cross recipient Barbara Harrison GC; and a new recognition for the Brontë sisters at their Bradford birthplace. (Tim Quantrill)
More than 20 works of art depicting some of Yorkshire’s “game changers, rebels and influencers” will go on display next month in the saloon galleries at Beningbrough Hall, an early 18th century red brick mansion north of York.Time Out gives 3 stars out of 5 to The Moors at Seymour Centre in Sydney.
The subjects include the former local resident Guy Fawkes, executed for his part in the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605, and the Skelmanthorpe actress Jodie Whittaker, who currently inhabits the character TV’s time travelling Doctor Who.
The veteran chat show host Michael Parkinson, who hails from Barnsley, is another subject, along with the Leeds boxer Nicola Adams, and Haworth’s Charlotte Brontë.
The script is lively and camp even when it comments on queer desire and unhealthy possession, female oppression and rage, and is written to be sharp and blackly comedic; it’s a pleasure to experience Silverman’s work.Entertainment Weekly interviews actress Samantha Morton about her role in The Walking Dead.
This production of The Moors, however, by independent group Siren Theatre Co and directed by Kate Gaul, doesn’t cut quite as cleanly or deeply as the script. It’s too loose and too broad to land with a satisfying rip; the production frequently feels at odds with the script. It’s more playful than cutting, more charming than precise, and while it’s still funny and easy to watch, there’s a sense that the work could be refined and elevated. You can’t get lost in these moors.
Still, there are highlights: the cast are all enjoyable to watch, and Bartz’s delivery of Agatha’s most dismissive lines is a delight. The slow-revolve upon which the show’s single setpiece (a running gag of meta-theatricality often mentioned in the script – yes, the bedroom does just look like the parlour!) is built creates a wonderfully off-kilter, low-key foreboding. Even if the production feels gentler and less impactful than its underlying script, Gaul’s direction does feel unified, consistent and thoughtful.
It’s a fun night, and there are plenty of laughs to be hard. But you may well feel like you’ve been left hanging; there’s a sense that we could have had more from The Moors than we ended up receiving. (Cassie Tongue)
Did you go back and look at the comic books at all? Yeah, I did look at it, and that’s really out of respect and intrigue. I’ve done adaptations of novels, like Jane Eyre or all sorts of things. I’ve played Myra Hindley, who is a real person, and I had to listen to tapes of her voice. That was for the film Longford I did years ago with Tom Hooper, and I was playing a real person. I have to do the research, and I have to be as respectful as I can be. But in the past when I’ve done adaptations, I get bogged down in an inspiring way, but I’m going back to the book all the time, saying to the writers and the directors, “But look, in here, it’s this and this and this!” It can actually hinder you. It doesn’t free you up when you’re on the set. (Dalton Ross)
Nantwich News reports that,A former Miss England from Nantwich has released an EP after collaborating with José Feliciano and Irish group Clannad.You can listen to the song here.
Natasha Hemmings, 23, hopes the release will launch her musical career while she completes her final year at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. [...]
For the past two years, she has been writing and recording her EP music, recorded at Abbey Road studios.
The EP release has three songs – “My Valentine” written by Natasha, “Wuthering Heights” and Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want To Miss a Thing”.
Charlotte Brontë to her former teacher, Constantin HégerGQ India shares '5 dating lessons you can learn from these classic romance novels', including one from Jane Eyre.
In 1842 Charlotte Brontë, famous author, moved to Brussels by herself to teach English and music, and fell madly in love with Constantin Heger, the school owner and French tutor.
Heger was a married man, and Brontë did do anything beyond sending him deep emotional letters to convey her love although from a distance. Heger did not respond to them, and perturbed, let his wife take over. Interestingly Madame Heger instructed Brontë to write at the most once in six months.
Fed up of the letters Heger tore up the letters but Madame fetched them from garbage and pinned them back together. Four decades later, Heger’s daughter submitted them to some publications to have these letters published and portray to the world, the complexity of Brontë’s character.
Quote
Perhaps you will say to me — “I no longer take the slightest interest in you Miss Charlotte — you no longer belong to my household — I have forgotten you.” Well Monsieur, tell me so candidly — it will be a shock to me — that doesn’t matter — it will still be less horrible than uncertainty.
1. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë(Seriously, what a silly lesson to draw from Jane Eyre!)
A rich landowner falls for her humble yet intelligent governess, Jane Eyre, and marries her. What’s different about this love story, you may ask? Well, for one, Mr. Rochester is hiding (quite literally) his old wife from his new one. As you can imagine, that did not go down well with Jane. What unfolds is a revolutionary story of a young girl who sets out to find her individuality and the eventual triumph of love over all.
Lesson to be learnt: Let your partner be their own person – you might need them to take care of you someday. (Radhika Agrawal)
Jane Eyre by Charlotte BrontëEspalha Factos (Portugal) has surprised us with one of the items of its list of best couples in literature.
With her 1847 novel, Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë created one of the most unforgettable heroines of all time. An orphan, the penniless and plain Jane endures incredible hardship to secure a governess position for a young girl in the creepy household of her employer, Mr Edward Rochester. Jane’s sharp wit and defiant nature meet with Rochester’s sardonic temperament, and the two form a deep, intense bond. But the house has dark secrets, and the courageous and spirited Jane is forced to make a heart-wrenching choice. An unconventional love story, it is ultimately the tale of one woman’s fight to claim her independence and self-respect in a society that has no place for her. [...]
Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
Published in 1847, the year before Emily Brontë’s death at the age of thirty, and incorporating elements of many genres—from gothic novels and ghost stories to poetic allegory—the author’s only novel is one of the nineteenth century’s most popular yet disturbing masterpieces. Heathcliff loves Catherine Earnshaw, and Catherine loves Heathcliff. But, class snobbery gets in the way of their passion. Through Catherine’s betrayal of Heathcliff and his bitter vengeance, their mythic passion haunts the next generation even after their deaths. With the windswept moors as the unforgettable setting, and the stark depiction of mental and physical cruelty, the novel challenges religious hypocrisy, morality, social classes and gender inequality. Love and anguish are hand in hand here. This is perhaps the most haunting and tormented love story ever written. (Archana Pai Kulkarni)
Jane Eyre e Mr. Rochester (Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë)Deccan Chronicle recommends 'Books that immortalise love in verses and stories'.
Jane Eyre conta a história da titular Jane, uma órfã que, após sair da escola interna para onde a tia a mandou, encontra trabalho como preceptora na mansão inglesa de Mr. Rochester, que tarda em fazer-se conhecer e, quando o faz, é rude e não muito bonito. Aliás, a própria Jane diz ser feia, mas nesta história, não é a aparência que importa. É a personalidade que Jane demonstra e desenvolve ao longo do romance – opinativa e surpreendentemente independente – que a tornou numa icónica personagem feminista, que com ela conquista o coração e a mente do duro e complicado (e não pouco problemático) Rochester, que só podem ficam juntos após sofrem ambos grandes perdas. [...]
Helen Graham e Gilbert Markham (A Inquilina de Wildfell Hall, Anne Brontë)
Uma das primeiras obras claramente feministas, A Inquilina de Wildfell Hall é um romance epistolar sobre Helen Graham, que surge na vila onde Gilbert Markham vive e aluga Wildfell Hall, onde vive com o filho e se dedica a pintar quadros que vende. A sua vida antes de ali chegar parece estar rodeada em mistério: quem ela será? Onde está o marido? Chocados, correm rumores entre os vizinhos, mas Markham não se deixa convencer pelas conversas da vila e tenta travar amizade com Helen, e da própria descobrir a sua história. O livro explora temas como os perigos do álcool e do jogo, e como estes podem destruir uma família, e a coragem de uma mãe que decide salvar o filho das más influências paternas, apesar de não só quebrar regras sociais como leis inglesas da altura ao fazê-lo. Mas apesar de tudo isto, Markham não julga Helen, pelo contrário, apoia-a e aceita-a, e ambos fazem um par que se complementa e compreende numa altura em que a igualdade entre um casal estava ainda longe de existir. (Mariana Nunes) (Translation)
Romance and literature have always intertwined with each other to create riveting manuscripts. Be it Heathcliff’s raw passion in Emily Brontë’s novel ‘Wuthering Heights’ or the strange affection shared between Hazel and Augustus in John Green’s ‘The Fault in our Stars’. (Ani)Latestly lists 'Hot Literary Heroes to Lust Over', including
Edward RochesterEl Diario (Spain) considers Wuthering Heights a toxic read for Valentine's Day but recommends it nonetheless.
Does not boast of a handsome face. Has a crazy wife locked up in his mansion’s attic. He is also moody, arrogant, cynical and jaded. That’s Charlotte Brontë’s hero (read: anti-hero) from Jane Eyre – Edward Rochester. Despite a long list of shortcomings, Mr Rochester sweeps the novel’s young heroine, Jane (as well as readers) off her feet. The brooding, difficult and secretive master of Thornfield Hall is not your ideal man. In fact, this Byronic hero is far from perfect. But despite all odds, you cannot stop from falling in love with him. Watch this "There Is No Debt" clip from 2011 movie Jane Eyre based on Brontë’s novel. It starred the very talented Michael Fassbender as Mr Rochester and wonderful Mia Wasikowska as Jane. (Rashmi Mishra)
TÓXICOLitHub has an article on 'On Kate Bush’s Radical Interpretation of Wuthering Heights. Or, how to teach English with a music video'. AnneBrontë.org wonders, 'What Was In The Brontë Valentine’s Day Cards?' and imagines what William Weightman's poems could have been like.
"Cumbres Borrascosas, de Emily Brontë. Más que sobre el amor romántico esta historia trata, entre muchas otras cosas, de una historia de dependencia emocional. Precisamente por eso, y porque pocas veces he estado más enamorado de una novela, recomiendo con entusiasmo su lectura.
Ahora bien, como en todo clásico, sólo sirve una lectura activa, atenta. El título de la novela no es sólo el nombre de una granja: esta borrasca es una historia de amor donde la obsesión roza lo obsceno y la cordura penetra en los terrenos de la servidumbre. Pero es aquí, en esta claudicación, donde la comunidad lectora tiene que comprender la necesidad de los límites y encontrar en sí mismo la arrogancia necesaria para mantener esa parcela propia de la dignidad. Un título recomendable a todos aquellos que sepan ver cuáles son las verdaderas cumbres borrascosas de las que hablaba Brontë". (Laura Ferrero) (Translation)
Ámbito Cultural El Core Inglés - Centro Comercial PamplonaVia Navarra.com.
Club de Lectura: Cumbres Borrascosas
February 25, 19:00 h to 20:00 h
Ámbito Cultural acoge un nuevo Club de Lectura.
La apuesta de Ámbito Cultural por la promoción de la lectura se convierte este curso en un club literario que permita a un grupo de personas hablar y compartir sus impresiones respecto a libros. Por lo que si has leído Cumbres borrascosas o te apetece leerlo durante este mes y venir a comentarlo, solo tienes que inscribirte y acudir a la cita mensual.
Cumbres borrascosas. El señor Earnshaw, dueño de Cumbres Borrascosas y padre de Catherine y de Hindley, adopta a Heathcliff, un niño huérfano. Entre Catherine y Heathcliff surgirán inmediatamente poderosos lazos que irán más allá de la amistad y del amor. Pero Hindley no soporta al intruso y hará de la vida de su hermanastro un infierno. Cuando Catherine, cediendo a las convenciones sociales, traba amistad con su vecino Edgar, Heathcliff desaparece. Volverá a Cumbres Borrascosas convertido en un ser sin escrúpulos, dispuesto a vengarse de ellos y de sus descendientes. Desde los salvajes páramos de Yorkshire, Emily Brontë escribió esta arrebatadora historia de pasión y amores cruzados considerada como una de las grandes novelas de la literatura inglesa.
As the Bradford City of Film celebrates its first decade, and the most romantic day of the year approaches, we thought we’d delve into our archives to bring you pictures of the timeless classic, Wuthering Heights, in all its various forms.Film School Rejects recommends 'The Best Valentine's Day Movies for Single People'.
Over the years there have been many adaptations of Emily Brontë's novel, Wuthering Heights, from the rather inaccurate 1939 version starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon, to ITV's 2009 two-part drama series featuring Charlotte Riley as Cathy and Tom Hardy as Heathcliff.
Bringing Emily’s masterpiece to the stage in 2002 and 2009, it was a case of life imitating art for Northern Ballet Composer Claude-Michel who had fallen in love with the company’s principal dancer, Charlotte Talbot, during rehearsals, and later married.
One thing for sure, is that the bleakly beautiful West Yorkshire moors have often helped to define the way readers and critics have interpreted Wuthering Heights, bringing filmmakers back, year after year, to film in locations across the region including Oakwell Hall, Birstall, East Riddlesden Hall, and Keighley. (Odele Ayres)
Belle (2013)The Independent also finds traces of Byronic heroes in the film The Souvenir.
As far as I’m concerned, it’s not a true romance marathon unless there’s a period piece involved. The world before the invention of dick pics just seems inherently more romantic. The more traditional choice would be to go with something adapted from Austen or a Brontë sister, but Belle is my go-to for two important reasons. First, its social and historical commentary give you a little bit more to chew on while still keeping all the fun lordly talk and courtship shenanigans one expects from a period piece. Second, love interest John Davinier (Sam Reid) has that sort of smoldering broodiness that makes Byronic heroes so addictive without the problematic power dynamics or the abusiveness of a Mr. Rochester or a Heathcliff — Byronic hero lite. (Ciara Wardlow)
The film shows Julie with her fellow students at the film school and then with Anthony. It’s as if she is living in two completely separate worlds. Burke plays Anthony with subtlety, catching his raffishness and his charisma but also his leech-like neediness. “You’re not normal, you’re a freak,” …you’re lost and you will always be lost,” he tells her but he could just as well be describing himself. There’s a hint of Jane Eyre’s Rochester or Wuthering Heights’s Heathcliff about him, albeit he is a druggier version of such archetypes. (Geoffrey Macnab)And more on film on The Week, which looks at the work of cinematographer Robbie Ryan on The Favourite.
Irish cinematographer Robbie Ryan, who worked on The Favourite, is long overdue for an award, with more than 80 projects under his belt to date (including a film I think is particularly beautifully shot, 2011's Wuthering Heights). (Jeva Lange)Noticias (Uruguay) interviews writer Laura Ramos, who wrote the Brontë biography Infernales.
Noticias: ¿Cómo tuvo las agallas de meterse con la familia Brontë, tan emblemática en la literatura inglesa?Spitalfields Life features the Cornhill door with an engraving of the Brontës.
Laura Ramos: No lo siento como un atrevimiento, era lo que tenía que hacer. Desde muy chica declamaba los guiones de estos libros del siglo XIX, mientras mi madre me hablaba, le contestaba con un diálogo de “Mujercitas”. Toda mi lucha fue tratar de ser uno de esos personajes. Es mi identidad y la palanca desde la que manejo mi mundo y me relaciono con él, todo lo demás son esfuerzos para vivir en esta realidad que no me agrada. Cuando terminé el libro, fue como decirles a mis amigos: “Ya no se rían más de que tengo frío, de que me gusta vestirme como monja, de que soy delicada, es por esto, esta soy yo”. [...]
Noticias: Cuenta cómo las Brontë se construyeron un mundo mental paralelo, por ejemplo cuando Emily y Anne viajan a York y actúan como si fueran los personajes de sus invenciones. Ese parece haber sido también su propio sello.
Ramos: ¡Así me sentía en el tren la primera vez que fui al pueblito de las Brontë, estaba en estado de trance! Me estaba jugando mi vida. Estaba frente a la lápida de la cocinera de la familia, llovía y me aferraba. Quería que la lluvia me fundiera con la lápida porque esa es la vida que siempre anhelé tener.
Noticias: ¿Analizó la razón de esa devoción por un tiempo y un espacio tan diferente del que le tocó?
Ramos: No sé si es tan diferente porque lo que sucede entre el libro y vos es tan intenso… Cuando estaba leyendo “Jane Eyre”, era mucho más vívido y estaba aprovechando mucho más el sol en mi lectura que mi hermano y los otros que jugaban en la playa. (Valeria García Testa) (Translation)
Valentines Day:Who’s the ultimate romantic hero?
Thursday, February 14, 2019 at 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM
Elizabeth Gaskell House, 84 Plymouth Grove, M13 9LW Manchester
Join us for a panel discussion on romantic heroes of Victorian Literature and cheer for your favourite literary leading man.
Is it the wild and brooding Heathcliff, the man who stole Catherine’s heart in Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights?
Or is it the brooding and mysterious Mr Rochester, who earned the love of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre?
Or are you smitten by the strong-willed and handsome Mr Thornton, the masterful hero of Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South?
Come along and vote for your favourite hero of Victorian literature, in the very house where Gaskell dreamt up Mr Thornton himself.
Libby Tempest will chair the panel as our passionate advocates, Diane Duffy, Sherry Ashworth and Elizabeth Williams, plead the case for their chosen leading man!
Pull up a seat from 1.30-2.30pm in the Servants Hall and indulge in some literary Valentine’s Day romance at Elizabeth Gaskell’s House.
So, if you happen to glance at my books, you will soon come to realise that I am an incorrigible consumer of fiction. Authors that I have come to rely upon like old friends make multiple appearances: Nick Hornby, David Foster Wallace, Stephen Fry, Ian McEwan, Barbara Pym, Stella Gibbons, Jane Austen, Agatha Christie, Emma Donoghue. Non-fiction finds some representation, in the form of Bill Bryson’s travel narratives, literary theory, journo lit, a few memoirs and autobiographies. Inside a considerable number of my books you will find lovingly scrawled inscriptions from dear friends, referencing inside jokes, vouching for a new writer they are sure I will love, and vowing eternal sisterhood.According to 10 Daily, Jane Eyre is one of 'The Best Love Stories In Literature'.
Oh, and you will also find some 15-odd copies of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights.
I can’t exactly recall when my epic saga with Brontë began. I have a vague, probably false, memory of the book being discussed in a brief aside by my English teacher in class when I was seven or eight, and already showing signs of literary besotted-ness. I remember waddling up to my then-librarian and requesting a copy of Wuthering Heights, please. She handed me an abridged version of the classic which I laboured through, liberally skipping pages and failing to understand much of anything. In fact, nothing made sense back then.
Why were the people speaking like this? What are moors? What is a grange? Where is Yorkshire? Why are these kids not going to school? There was still something about the book, though – or was it just my childish stubbornness? – that made me stick it out. When I eventually turned the last page, something had changed. I knew I would find my way back to it again when I was older, more ready. True to my prophecy, I returned to the book again when I was in high school, about 15. (Read more) (Neha Yadav)
Jane Eyre by Charlotte BrontëInquirer also lists Jane Eyre among the 'Best Romance Books All Time'.
The epitome of complex relationships, it would be difficult to write about complicated love stories without mentioning Jane Eyre. (First comes love, then comes … a mentally ill wife locked in the attic).
It is an admirable feat that Charlotte Brontë manages to turn this plot into a convincing love story that continues to resonate more than 150 years after it was written. (Fleur Morrison)
Charlotte Brontë’s Jane EyreFar Out Magazine suggests 'Top 7 last-minute destinations for a perfect Valentine’s Day' in Britain, including
An outcast and an orphan, Jane Eyre, accepts a governess position for a girl in slightly mysterious circumstances with Edward Rochester, a brooding and dark master. What secrets are concealed in Thornfield Hall? Plus, what will Eyre do as she finds out about Rochester’s dark past? (AJ Estrada)
6. Haworth MoorA contributor to The Boar discusses her favourite genre, romance.
Moving on to another destination that will most likely appeal to bookworms, Haworth Moor is situated in Brontë County. Still, even if you are not an avid fan of the sisters’ work, Haworth Moor is the place for adventurous lovers that want to get away from the bustling city for Valentine’s Day.
This place mirrors the peak of Brontë’s work – namely melancholia and nostalgia, which are characteristic of their novels. The moorland setting is melancholic as it is enticing. (Will De Nardo)
My personal favourites came decades later. Firstly with the works of Jane Austen, who took the English society of her own time to pieces, presenting the reality of social interactions with humour and sensitivity, doing this all through romance novels. Austen’s works are closely followed by those of the Brontë sisters, as I can’t imagine more powerful words about love and gender equality than the ones Jane Eyre shouts at Mr. Rochester in Charlotte Brontë’s most famous work, Jane Eyre. (Greta Csernik)The 1851 Chronicle has yet another list, albeit not related to Valentine's Day. Here's one of '10 Ways to Beat the Winter Blues':
Read – There are so many fantastic new books out there that can take you to a place far away from these winter blues. Snuggle up with a classic like Jane Eyre or a new find: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck. Both are sure to deliver an engaging read. (Hannah Akerly)El mostrador (Chile) interviews editor Claudia Apablaza.
Si pudieras tomarte un traguito con un o una escritora, ¿Quién sería?Keighley News reports James Gorin von Grozny's latest Brontë theory.
Me tomaría un vino con Emily Brontë. La llevaría a la comida hindú que hay frente a mi casa. (Catalina Hernández) (Translation)
An art collector is exploring previously-unknown links between the Brontë family and the illustrious sixth Duke of Devonshire.Jane Eyre's Library (in Spanish) tells about a 1941 Spanish edition of Jane Eyre.
James Gorin von Grozny believes the Duke struck up a friendship with the Rev Patrick Brontë after admiring his daughter Charlotte’s painting of Bolton Abbey.
The Duke, William Cavendish Spencer, is renowned for his friendships with famous figures of the day such as Charles Dickens.
He and Patrick were both social campaigners: Patrick on the health of his parishioners, and the “Bachelor Duke” on slavery and factory working hours.
According to Mr Grozny, it is possible the Duke commissioned the first public toilet in England, at the top of Butt Lane in Haworth.
Von Grozny began researching links between the Brontës and the Duke as a spin-off of his efforts to authenticate a painting he believes shows Charlotte, Anne and Emily Bronte.
Mr Grozny believes his picture was painted in 1838 by famous Victorian artist Sir Edward Landseer, a friend of the Duke.
Mr Grozny this week said he was piecing together evidence pointing to relationships between Patrick, the sixth Duke and Landseer.
He said the links originated at the Royal Northern Exhibition in Leeds in 1834, where Charlotte displayed a picture she had created the previous summer while visiting the duke’s estate at Bolton Abbey.
Mr Grozny said Charlotte wrote in 1856 of her father’s meeting and exchange of gifts with the Duke, probably at the exhibition’s private viewing.
Mr Grozny said: “A proud and protective parson will have been alongside his daughter on this day. Having trusted and accepted the Duke’s hospitality the previous summer, no doubt Patrick would have been keen to meet the Duke.”
Mr Grozny said a newly-published letter from the Duke confirms Landseer was staying at the Bolton Abbey estate during the same summer the Brontës visited.
He believes a mysterious host only referred to as ‘E’ in accounts of the visit, who gave the teenage Brontë siblings a guided tour, was in reality Edwin Landseer.
Mr Grozny added: “It not known if the parson and Duke had correspondence or met again between 1834 and 1856. The duke’s pilgrimage to the parsonage in 1856 was extraordinary.
“It is not known what the parson gave the old Duke, or what they talked about, but it is likely they discussed the children’s visit to the Abbey in 1833, and the fantastic consequences.”
As further evidence, Mr Grozny said there was “comfortably conclusive” proof that a drawing, currently at the Brontë Parsonage Museum, was a portrait of the young Duke by Landseer. (David Knights)
A recent book which includes the Brontës:The Little Book of Feminist SaintsThe Brontës are the Matron Saints of Dreamers (Feast Day: April 15):
By Julia Pierpoint
Illustrated by Manjit Thapp
ISBN-13: 978-0399592744
Penguin Random House
This beautifully illustrated collection honoring one hundred exceptional “feminist saints” throughout history is sure to inspire women and men alike.
In this luminous volume, New York Times bestselling writer Julia Pierpont and artist Manjit Thapp match short, vibrant, and surprising biographies with stunning full-color portraits of secular female “saints”: champions of strength and progress. These women broke ground, broke ceilings, and broke molds—including.
Time and place are absurd abstractions in Silverman's world, and logic an extraneous luxury. Yet, like looking at a trompe l'oeil surrealist painting, themes of love and loneliness take shape and dance before your eyes.Williamsburg Yorktown Daily suggests places 'to spark first-date romance in Williamsburg'.
Emilie, the newly hired governess (Brielle Flynn), arrives at a house that is probably on the Yorkshire Moors (or might not be) with a reasonably firm grip on reality, only to find her fingers rapidly slipping. Nothing, you see, is quite as it seems. Agatha (Romy Bartz), the stern older sister of the diary-keeping Huldey (Enya Daly), has fraudulently hired Emilie by masquerading via letter as the sisters' brother, Branwell (the name of the Brontës' brother), who, is a bricked-in prisoner in the attic.
Kate Gaul's production and design (for Siren Theatre Co) astutely uses a slow-motion revolve to let us scrutinise moments of intra-scene stasis from different angles. In conjunction with Nate Edmondson's music she has maximised the inherent Gothic melodrama – in fact, perhaps too much too soon. The theatricality fizzes so vigorously in the text, itself, that the delivery could actually be underplayed. The key to non-naturalistic acting, after all, is not to add a side-order of ham to the theatrical feast, but to bare the truth that lies within this new reality.
Diana Popovska does this in portraying the maid (who, in a typically Silvermaniac flourish, is called Marjory in the parlour; Mallory in the scullery). As a direct result Popovska also maximises the humour of a play that is funnier than this production currently allows it to be. Bartz's Agatha is less austere than might have been expected, and therefore subsequent revelations come as less of a jolt. Nonetheless she, too, is expert at milking the zaniness, while maintaining a truthful core to her character.
The animals obviously occupy yet another parallel reality, and if one suspects still more could be made of the moorhen, Francis is charming in depicting the poor bird's dull-brained naivety. Campbell's philosophical mastiff may have benefited from a deeper-pitched voice as he pursues his improbable love affair and its dark, unfortunate consequences. Daly could earn more of Huldey's latent laughs by pulling back early on, but she comes into her own when spearing towards lunacy. Flynn has further to go to mine the truth of Emilie. She already has something of the requisite vivacity, and now faces the snag of how to play "normal" in a mad, mad world. If these performances settle during the season, audiences will relish Silverman's quixotic imagination – whether Brontë aficionado or not. (John Shand)
Nearby Mermaid Books also has first-date potential, with its quirky decor. There are comic strips taped to the walls and mermaid paintings on stools and above bookshelves. Plus, the scent of books — and being surrounded by literary romances from “Pride and Prejudice” to “Wuthering Heights” — could create an intimate mood. (Alexa Doiron)AnneBrontë.org has a post on the background of Charlotte and Emily's journey to Brussels.
